Month: February 2022

Author Ed Hornick has suffered from “long COVID” conditions since May 2020. (Courtesy of Ed Hornick)It has been nearly two years since my “mild” coronavirus infection cleared up and I began having symptoms of “long COVID.” In that time, I’ve undergone seven CT scans, five ultrasounds, two spinal taps, two X-rays, two lung function tests, one MRI, one echocardiogram and one sleep study. I’ve made three trips to the emergency room, been hospitalized once and had care provided by 27 doctors, nine nurse practitioners, three physician’s assistants and one therapist. And here’s the brutal reality: I’m still not any closer to finding a clear solution to end this living nightmare. One question continues to haunt me: Will I ever get better? In an effort to answer it, I’ve sought out the advice of...

A team of researchers in New York City was searching for the coronavirus in the city’s wastewater when they discovered something surprising — viral fragments with a unique collection of mutations for a coronavirus variant that had been never been discovered. Why this matters: This is a potential sign of a new undetected COVID-19 variant that hasn’t made its way through New York City or the country yet. Yes, but: Researchers said there’s no evidence that the lineage could become a risk to humans since it’s been circulating for at least one year, according to The New York Times. What’s happening: The New York City researchers published their recent findings in the scientific journal Nature Communications. They’re still unsure where this potential variant came from. They susp...

Medical experts at UC Davis are escalating concerns over the dangerous long-term impacts of COVID-19 in unvaccinated children."They can be really scary sick," said Dr. Dean Blumberg, UC Davis' chief of pediatric infectious diseases. "Some of these children are in the ICUs, are on ventilators, sometimes need support of medications to help with heart function or blood pressure." COVID-19 cases among children rose in January after the holidays. Pediatric infections now make up the majority of cases at UC Davis Medical Center. "We certainly have been seeing kids with MIS-C," Blumberg said. "They can have involvement of the brain, heart, kidneys ... any of those can be damaged and result in long-term damage."MIS-C, or multisystem inflammatory syndrome, is rare, impacting one out of every ...

It's time to let the young, healthy and "anyone who wants to move on" from the pandemic do so, said Dr. Stefanos Kales, a professor at Harvard Medical School. In a paper posted on LinkedIn last month, Kales said that for the majority of children and adults, "Covid-19 is not a serious threat, only a nuisance that impedes schooling, work and travel." "Once Omicron peaks, subsequent variants are likely to be even more mild," he said. "We badly need to allow the general public, particularly the young, to get back to normal life." He said he favors focusing Covid-19 efforts on "the vulnerable" rather than the population as a whole. "Many reasoned, outspoken and honest scientists have been making the point that Covid-19 is moving rapidly from a 'pandemic' … to an 'endemic' re...